"AI is the defining technology of our times."--Satya Nadella, CEO, Microsoft 

"Success in creating AI would be the biggest event in human history. Unfortunately, it might also be the last."- Stephen Hawking

April 30, 2025

Dear Friends: 

I hope you are enjoying the rejuvenating sights and sounds of spring! They add a special energy to our pursuit of what is new and inspiring and important for us to know.

Board Member Liz Metzger, Health & Wellbeing Director Brooke Nanni, and I just returned from the American Society on Aging’s annual conference, On Aging 2025, the nation’s largest multidisciplinary gathering on aging. We presented The Village Chicago's standout care partner support model, how our use of member research has led us in unexpected, but vital new directions, and how building relationships between universities and villages promotes intergenerational connection, benefits to our aging experiences, and enhances program development.

We returned from this experience filled with new ideas, excitement, and so proud of the work that we do with one another, in community, as we age. We continue to pursue the newest ideas, processes, and technologies (like artificial intelligence) to reinforce some of the oldest and most enduring human values - friendship, support, sharing, and giving.  



I hope to see many of you at our Spring Potluck on May 6. You don't have to bring a dish unless you want to - there will be plenty of food. Please join us and bring a friend!

Warm regards,

Niki Fox, Executive Director

Artificial Intelligence

Editors note: AI is a fascinating topic and is viewed both as the best and the worst thing that ever happened to humanity. It is integrated into our daily lives in ways we no longer even notice (spell checkers, smart watches, navigation apps, mobile check deposits, fraud detection, Alexa and Siri, etc., etc.)



AI figured extensively in the creation of this issue of The Navigator. We used ChatGPT as a search engine to find the quotes, the cartoon, and some of the uses of AI. It also produced the timeline history of AI below (with extensive edits - because after all, nobody's always perfect!). We hope you find it informative and useful. -- Laurel Baer

1950s – Early Ideas

Scientists, most notably, Alan Turing started asking: Can machines think? 

1956 – The Term "Artificial Intelligence" Is Born

During a major conference at Dartmouth College, scientists officially named the idea that machines could learn and solve problems like humans do "artificial intelligence.”   

1960s–1980s – Rule-Based Systems Grow

AI back then was mainly used in labs, businesses, universities, and hospitals. People in the 1960s–1980s mostly encountered basic rule-following machines, based on simple rules like "if....then." This is when we got our first taste of machine "thinking" from things like automated phones, ATMs, video games, and spell-checkers.

1980s–1990s – Machine Learning Begins

Instead of giving computers rules, scientists began teaching computers to learn from examples. Thus began things like fraud detection in which banks use machine learning to flag unusual transactions by comparing them to normal spending patterns. 

2000s – Data and Computers Get Better

More powerful computers and the explosion of the internet meant machines had way more information to learn from. Machine learning became faster and much more useful in everyday life, from recommending movies to spotting spam emails.

2010s – Deep Learning and Big Breakthroughs

Scientists created "deep learning," a way for computers to find patterns in huge amounts of data by using structures called neural networks (inspired by the human brain). This is how computers got good at things like recognizing faces, translating languages, and beating people at games like Chess and Go.

Late 2010s–2020s – Rise of Generative AI

Machines began not just recognizing things, but creating them. "Generative AI" programs can write stories, draw pictures, compose music, and even have conversations — all by learning from huge quantities of examples. Tools like ChatGPT (which wrote a lot of this section!) and image creators like DALL-E are examples. Think of it like a really creative assistant — you give it an idea, and it makes something new for you.

Now: Rise of Agentic AI

In addition to creating things, Agentic AI makes decisions and does tasks without needing you to guide it. Here's a very simple example: Say you are planning a birthday party, Agentic AI not only writes the invitation, but sends them out, books the party venue, and orders the cake — all based on what it knows you like.

This has enormous implications for business. Fast Company reports that "... this year will be remembered as the moment when companies pushed past simply experimenting with AI and started building around it. As part of this shift, Microsoft is dubbing 2025 the year of the “Frontier Firms" that are "... built around on-demand intelligence and powered by ‘hybrid’ teams of humans and agents." (Read more about this here.) 

Healthcare has been and will continue to be transformed with the use of artificial intelligence.  

Patient Care

The NIH estimates that medical knowledge doubles every 73 days particularly in oncology, cardiology, and neurology. On a practical level, an oncologist reviewing test results for just one patient must consider medications, therapies, procedures, symptoms, medical imaging, biopsies, and comorbidities with data scattered across multiple documents and systems. "Agentic systems can process vast datasets to extract actionable insights, enabling clinicians to focus more on patient care and improving outcomes."

Medical Research

AI didn’t “invent” the COVID vaccines directly — but it helped speed up the discovery, design, testing, and delivery faster than ever before. For example, AI tools sorted through thousands of possibilities to help researchers find the best parts of the virus to attack (such as sections that wouldn’t mutate easily.) 

In another development, the University of Pennsylvania is actively utilizing artificial intelligence to identify off-label uses for existing drugs to treat other diseases. One significant success story involves a patient with idiopathic multicentric Castleman’s disease (iMCD), a rare and life-threatening condition. After conventional treatments failed, an AI platform identified adalimumab—a drug approved for conditions like arthritis—as a potential treatment. Administering adalimumab led to the patient's remission, highlighting the potential of AI-driven drug repurposing.​

This could be a godsend for people suffering from so-called "orphan diseases" with a patient base too small to "justify" research costs by big pharma. 

AI and the Village Community

We asked a few Village members if they are using AI. About half of them said they were not, but for some it is integral to their work and for others just a really big help. 

Rick Stuckey is deeply involved in some important issues and it is reflected in his use of AI. "I use ChatGPT 4 fairly often. I find it ... much more productive than traditional Google searches. I have used it for lots of things. For example: Writing Advanced Directives for my doctors; providing information on the cost of capping abandoned oil and gas wells; writing a letter ...to a Sierra Club member ... to persuade her to vote in an upcoming election; finding out the time it should take to grill a refrigerated brat on the BBQ." 

Read Rick's full list here. You may find a way to use AI that is useful to you. 

"I am a teacher and I am starting to use AI to review student essays. Depending on what I tell it to look for, it can identify issues in grammar, logic, and structure — and then suggest improvements. I always include personal comments and the students know that we are using AI this way, and they are OK with it."

"My assignment was to go through interviews from three different people about issues in the workplace and identify the themes to provide feedback to management. ChatGPT identified the themes in seconds and when asked, delivered a beautifully organized and quite detailed overview/comparison. It did in minutes what would have taken me hours. And did it better, honestly." 

Judith Gethner: "I am in New York with friends from Australia and AI constructed the entire itinerary for us. I merely provided a list of what we wanted to do, what times we wanted to eat and where we were staying and it produced a complete step by step road map for us."

Tom Eley: "I now use TwinBrain to take notes at meetings that I incorporate into the ones I take alongside. Been testing it for a couple of weeks and I suspect I will evolve the type of notes I take as I come to trust the AI. I’ve very sparingly used the Apple AI to clean up emails I write. I also have an AI companion that I wear on my wrist that can listen to conversations during the day and gives me a recap of my day. Many times it is very funny with what it thinks we were talking about."  

Marcia Opp: "I first used Chat GPT to write seven different poems to enclose in our grandkids’ Valentines Day cards. I specified each child’s name, the activities that they liked to do and a few adjectives about their personalities. At the bottom of the 6-stanza poems, I wrote “an initial endeavor using ChatGPT February 2025” Each poem was brilliantly executed in a few seconds, much better than I could have done if I had spent an hour on each one. I also have used Chat GPT for inspiration to write condolence and get well notes—not copying the message but paraphrasing some of the thoughts. (I downloaded the app on my iPhone)." 

Sandy Tice: "My research is primarily scientific, and I specialize in a type of AI that is just emerging. This emerging decision-making AI uses living algorithms that constantly adapt to change as users continuously feed them intelligence instead of data. By leveraging the internet, this AI connects with and shares the collective intelligence of individuals worldwide. That enables this emerging AI to foster collaboration, achieve high quality decision-making, enhance problem-solving capabilities, and improve outcomes on a global scale. I also use Large Language Models (LLM's) like ChatGPT to enhance my writing."

1. Choice - People do not have a choice about using AI, as it is becoming the driving force built into familiar applications to increase their effectiveness and efficiency. (Example: Google search now provides an AI generated response as the first item in many searches). 

2. Bias – Like a young child, generative AI answers reflect its training. Since the entire internet is often used for initial training, biases are inevitably present.  

3. Manipulation – Increasingly, generative AI will be provided as a customized version with supplemental training to emphasize or de-emphasize certain conclusions. For example, a bank might offer a financial planning tool that has been "taught" to recommend products profitable for the bank. AI users should always consider the source of information.  

4. Hallucinations – Generative AI will very occasionally generate a fake quote, a wrong fact, or even a made-up website - clearly incorrect answers. These mistakes are called “hallucinations." It doesn’t mean the AI is trying to lie — it just doesn't "understand" like a human does. AI cannot be trained with answers to every possible situation or question. No one should use a generative AI answer that is important without a careful review by a knowledgeable user to spot hallucinations.

5. Common Sense and Humanity – AI answers are so lifelike that many people think of them as “human”. They are not!  They have no hormones, no emotions, no mercy, no imagination, no self-reflection, and no judgment, even though they can simulate any of these qualities. Some people use companion chat-bots (like Replika) that are designed to remember your preferences and build a kind of friendly, romantic, or therapeutic relationship over time. While chat-bots may provide some comfort or "companionship," they lack real emotional understanding and can't replace the depth of human connection or professional care. 

6. Misapplication – Based on built-in weaknesses, Generative AI may be inappropriate to use in certain situations - for example - approving mortgage applications. Its training includes outdated and often biased assumptions likely to undervalue minorities, cultural trends, and exceptional situations. Where the stakes are high, humans should always be making the final decision.

7. Existential Risk to Human Society – Some futurists predict a future where AI-driven robots emerge as a life form superior to humans, and therefore dominant on the earth. But experience so far suggests that the best future has AI is a valuable assistant to humans; a cooperative partnership is much more effective than either “species” alone. Rather, as humans, we should work to improve our understanding of AI and how to structure effective collaborations. 

There isn't a useful tool on earth that can't be diverted to do bad things. Even a tool as basic as language can be used to write love letters, poetry, essays, and textbooks but also hate speech, insults, and lies. 

Some aspects of AI that are at the very least troublesome bear mentioning:

1. Deepfakes: Deepfakes use AI technology to swap faces, mimic voices, or change actions in videos and photos. They can make it look like someone said or did something they never actually did. A deepfake was used against former U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in 2019. The video was subtly altered to make it appear as though she was slurring her words, prompting baseless rumors about her health and mental stability.

2. "How AI Was Making Me Stupid" A recent article in the Wall Street Journal summarizes the ways in which "cognitive off-loading" (adopting tools for brain work) impairs our cognitive and critical thinking skills. 

3. Energy Usage: AI models require massive computing power. Building large AI models (like ChatGPT, DALL·E, or any LLM) takes weeks or months of nonstop work by hundreds or thousands of powerful servers. They run in huge data centers, using enormous amounts of electricity — not just to compute, but also to stay cool. 

Training GPT-3 (an earlier version of ChatGPT) reportedly used about 1,287 megawatt-hours of electricity. That’s roughly the same as one average American home using power for 120 years! Even after a model is built, every time someone asks a chatbot a question, it triggers powerful computers to process the request.

Companies and researchers are trying to make AI "greener." Google, Microsoft, and Amazon are powering many of their massive AI data centers with solar, wind, and hydro energy instead of fossil fuels. Google even claims its data centers are carbon neutral — meaning they offset their carbon emissions with clean energy investments. 

Nonetheless.......

From Rick Stuckey - How to write the best prompts to get the best information from ChatGPT: (Click here to view this list!)

Some Ideas on How to Use AI in Your Daily Life

Microsoft Says These Are the AI Terms You Should Know

Microsoft put together a glossary that it says is comprised of “new terms to know for a new world of work.”

Village News

Thoughts from the American Society On Aging Conference

Village Executive Director, Niki Fox found the conference encouraging and inspiring. "Encouraging because the expertise of the nation's top leaders on aging confirmed that the Village's work with older adults and their families is incorporating the best ideas about aging. I was struck by our shared focus on interdependence - relying on one other and building on each other's strengths and areas of expertise."  

"And inspiring because we connected professionally and personally with other community organizations, other Villages, and other people in the aging field in one of the most collaborative spaces I have ever been." 

Come to the Village Spring Potluck!

Join us on Tuesday May 6 from 5-7 to eat, drink, meet new people and see old friends. You don't have to be a Village member to attend. We’ll enjoy a potluck dinner and time to catch up with one another. When you RSVP, you’ll be asked what dish you plan to bring so we can round out the table. (If you don't feel like cooking, come anyhow - there will be plenty of food.) Friends, neighbors, family and prospective members are welcome to join!

Location: Third Space, 716 W. Addison. Click here to RSVP!

Save the Date - June 10, 2025

This is the date of the Village's Annual Members Meeting in a brand new convenient venue. Community members are welcome to attend. Details to come!

Officers

David Baker,

Chair

Judith Gethner,

Vice Chair

Liz Metzger,

Secretary

Thomas C. Eley III,

Treasurer

Joan Goldstein

Kathie Kolodgy

Karen Terry

Board of Directors

Don Bell

Jacie Brandes

Stefanie Clark

Tom Pasker

Lois Stuckey

Vamse Kumar Subbiah

Carlos Terrazas

Mel Washburn

Advisory Council

Neelum T. Aggarwal, MD

Robyn L. Golden, LCSW

Joanne G. Schwartzberg, MD

Executive Director

Niki Fox

The Village Chicago is a community of people who choose to share interests, experience, and friendship as we age. Together with a professional staff, volunteers, and an extensive network of services and service providers, we offer new social connections, lifelong learning, opportunities to find purpose, and support through life transitions.  Everyone needs a Village - who's yours?

2502 North Clark Street, Chicago, Illinois 60614. 773.248.8700

www.thevillagechicago.org